THEORETICAL CONTEXT OF THE STUDY
3.2 Definitions of Marxism and its historical development
3.2.1. Fundamental ideas of Marxism
There are different angles that offer comprehensive insight into the knowledge of Marx and what constitutes the fundamental ideas of the Marxist theory. These insights may tend to differ from one critic to the other; one thing that remains significant in any discussion on the Marxist theory is the mention of materialism and class struggle. The two ideas of materialism and class struggle therefore provide the foundational platform of the Marxist thought. By elaboration, the fundamental ideas of the Marxist theory include but not exclusively on some of the ideas which I will engage with.
One of the first fundamental ideas of the Marxist theory is on the emphasis that social life is based upon a conflict of interest which revolves around members of the bourgeoisie class who believe that social life as a whole is based upon
“conflicts of interest.” This class conflict revolves around the upper class that own and control the means of production and the lower class (proletariat) who sell their labour power. The bourgeoisie class dominates and exploits the proletariat who are practically involved in the production process (Schaff, 2013).
Secondly, Marxism aims at exposing the political and economic contradictions that are inherent in capitalism. What this means is that while people co-operate to produce goods, capitalist class appropriates the goods for private purposes.
This type of system creates an unequal basis and aims at frustrating the productive efforts of the proletariat. Why the capitalist class cannot work for themselves, they depend on the workforce of the proletariat. This is what Marx considers a continuous conflict between these two modes of production (Marx, 1976).
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Another fundamental idea of the Marxist theory is that he emphasizes on the total critique of Capitalist society. In order to comprehend the way things, appear he stresses that there is need to understand how social life is shaped through a combination of economic, political and ideological conflicts.
The conceptual vision behind Marxist criticism therefore is that works of literature are mere products of historical forces that can be studied by looking at the social and material circumstances in which they were created. In Marx’s
“Das Kapital” ‘the approach to creation of material life explains altogether the societal and political process. Marx stated that, it is not the perception of men that defines their existence, but on the contrary their social life that influences their consciousness. The implication of this is that, the social situation of the author decides the types of characters that will develop, the political ideas displayed and the economical statements developed in the text (Niemi, 2011).
Marxism therefore, is a highly complex subject of inquiry. This is due to its diverse mode and method of application among societies of the world. The branch or sector known as Marxist literary criticism is no less a complex field of inquiry. My concern in this chapter is not to look at the general ideas of Marxism but how the concept functions in literature and how it provides a tool and framework for literary analysis. Eagleton (1976, p.i.), comments that,
“Marxist criticism involves more than merely re-stating cases set out by the founders of Marxism. It also involves more than what has become known in the West as the ‘sociology of literature’.” Eagleton proceeds to argue that:
The sociology of literature concerns itself chiefly with what might be called the means of literary production, distribution and exchange in a particular society—how books are published, the social composition of their authors and audiences, levels of literacy, the social determinants of ‘taste’. It also examines literary texts for their
‘sociological’ relevance... (Eagleton, 1976, p.i).
Eagleton concludes by stating that, the limitation of Marxist criticism to the
‘sociology of literature’ is a tamed version that is appropriate for use by the
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west. This is essentially so in the limited sense of the worldview that emanates from the Western and African thought. Eagleton again presents a clarification when he says that;
Marxist criticism is not merely a ‘sociology of literature’, concerned with how novels are published and whether they mention the working class. Its aim is to explain the literary work more fully; and this means a sensitive attention to its forms, styles and meanings. But it also means grasping those forms, styles and meanings as the products of a particular history (Eagleton, 1976, p.i).
My interest therefore is to understand how Marxism functions and reflects in the reading and interpretation of literature, especially African literature. I will engage here with the three Nigerian authors and their selected plays for this study. The phenomenon of suicide is the central concern that will be looked at in the three Nigerian texts and through a Marxists lens. Let me declare however that, Marxist literary theory is also referred to as Marxist literary criticism and I will be using these interchangeably.
There are a number of concerns raised by scholars in relation to what Marxist literary criticism entails. Marxists generally, conceive of literature as a reflection of those social institutions out of which it emerges and which itself is a social institution with a particular ideological function. On the one hand Abrams (1999, p.149) sees Marxist literary criticism "not as works created in accordance with timeless artistic criteria, but as 'products' of the economic and ideological determinants specific to that era." To Abrams literature reflects an author's own class or analysis of class relations, however piercing or shallow that analysis may be. Marxist literary criticism is also seen as a loose expression describing literary criticism based on socialist and dialectic theories. Marxist criticism views literary works as reflections of the social institutions from which they originate. According to Marxists, literature itself is a social institution and has a specific ideological function, based on the background and ideology of the author (Mulhern, 2014). Eagleton, the great literary critic and cultural theorist says in his preface to Marxism and literary criticism (1976) that, Marxist criticism analyses literature in terms of the historical conditions that
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produce it; and it needs, similarly, to be aware of its own historical conditions.
It is therefore of vital importance to appropriate these conceptions and how they reflect on Soyinka’s Death and the Kings horseman, Rotimi’s Kurunmi and Ogunyemi’s The Vow.
The selected texts for this study are historical texts that recall the history that took place before the texts where written. They serve in essence as documented accounts of what transpired at a particular age of the Oyo Yoruba people of South-West Nigeria. Incidentally the authors; Soyinka, Rotimi and Ogunyemi belong to what Ogunbiyi (1976) in his book History of Nigerian drama and theatre: A critical source book classifies as the first generation playwrights or first Nigerian dramatists. What this means is that, they were among the first playwrights to introduce full literary works on the Nigerian stage. Although their works were partly a product of fiction, they provided historical narratives of the society at a specific point in time.
If Marxist criticism is therefore concerned with the historical conditions that produce a literary work as expressed by Eagleton, then the question is; how does the literary work of Soyinka’s Death and the Kings Horseman, Rotimi’s Kurunmi and Wale Ogunyemi’s The Vow reflect this? Rotimi’s play Kurunmi is based on an actual history which took place among the Yoruba people of Oyo in the South-West part of Nigeria from 1859-1861. Historically, after the defeat of Ilorin by Ibadan in 1840, rivalry between Ibadan and Ijaye developed. Then, the Ibadan population had increased to over 60,000 by 1851. The Oyo Yoruba had come to dominate the political life of the town, and a political system gradually evolved which was well suited to military expansion (Ade, 2006).
There was no Oba, and chiefships were not hereditary. The chiefs were organised into four lines of authority: the civil chiefs, led by the Bale; the military chiefs in two lines, headed by the Balogun and the Seriki; and the women chiefs led by the Iyalode. Within each of these lines, the titles were ranked, and each chief moved up a rank as those above him died or were killed in battle. The bottom ranks were filled by Magaji, the elected leaders of the Ibadan descent groups. A Balogun who had proved himself in war usually filled the most senior title, which is the Bale (Ade, 2006).
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The fact that there was no Oba reflected the theoretical suzerainty of the Alaafin, though from its foundation Ibadan pursued an independent foreign policy. In the 19th century the military chiefs usually had the greatest authority. Promotion to a title depended on a man's ability to mobilise a following and on military skill. Prestige and wealth came from warfare and the result was an aggressive policy of expansion. Ijaye was founded about the same time as Ibadan, by refugees from the Ikoyi area, led by Kurunmi, who was considered the 'greatest soldier of his age'. It became an important communications centre, and under strong leadership it prospered. By this time, Ijaye had an estimated population of 40,000. Initially, relations with Ibadan were good, but rivalry between the two gradually developed. An issue for a final confrontation was provided by the death of Alaafin Atiba in 1859. He was succeeded by the Aremo Adelu, his son against tradition, and Kurunmi refused to recognise the succession. Ijaye and Oyo were already at loggerheads over the control of the Upper Ogun towns around Saki. Ibadan however sided with the new Alaafin and war broke out.
Kurunmi committed suicide foreseeing his defeat in 1861, before the final capture and destruction of his town (Smith, 1962).
The historical account contained in the narrative of the war between Ibadan and Ijaiye from 1859–1861 centered on the issue of power, political dominance and secession among the social relations of the people. It also accounts for the struggle between members of the élites; the kings, the chiefs and the elders in an attempt to control resources and legitimize power. This scenario is what the Marxists distinguish as the base and the superstructure. Marx himself, in his A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy affirms that:
In the social production of their life, men enter into definite relations that are indispensable and independent of their will, relations of production which correspond to a definite stage of development of their material productive forces. The sum total of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which rises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions the social, political
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and intellectual life process in general. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but on the contrary, their social being that determines their consciousness (Marx, 1904, p.14).
The social relations between the people of Ibadan and Ijaiye was determined by their quest to own resources like land, cattle and even slaves who could work on the farms. The king, Aremo Adelu influenced the people and enthroned his son Atiba against the custom of the land. This involved manipulation of the political superstructure to which corresponded definite forms of social consciousness. The history as well as political and socio-economic circumstance of the Ibadan-Ijaiye war is what Rotimi reflects in his play, Kurunmi.
It is important also that I interrogate and explain the dynamics of the period in which Rotimi’s play Kurunmi was written in relation to the author’s ideology as well as the circumstance at the time of his writing. The play Kurunmi was written in the year 1971which came after a century and a decade (110years) of the actual war. During the period that Rotimi wrote the play Kurunmi, Nigeria had just finished experiencing a civil war against Biafra (1967-1970) who was fighting for secession. The Biafrans who were a socio-political majority in the Eastern region of Nigeria felt marginalized by the Nigerian state in terms of political formation, economic imbalance as well as social alienation and a preferred choice was for a secession from Nigeria. The war, which lasted for three years, recorded the loss of lives and property by both parties until the Biafrans conceded defeat (Stremlau, 2015). The circumstance of the war between Ibadan and Ijaiye from 1851-1861 and that of Nigeria and Biafra from 1967-1970 were based on the economic structure and the struggle between the base and the superstructure. Rotimi, in trying to provide his historical narrative of the Ibadan-Ijaiye war, was unconsciously I think influenced by the Nigerian- Biafran civil war that ended just a year after his writing of the play.
The publishers of Rotimi’s Kurunmi, the University Press Ibadan were a pioneer publishing company in Nigeria at the time. With the establishment of the then University College London (UCL) in 1948 which became University College
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Ibadan (UCI) and now University of Ibadan (UI) as the first University in Nigeria, the press provided the opportunity and intellectual space for pioneer writers to get their works published. The University Press Ibadan was established in 1949 as Oxford University Press and later metamorphosed into the University Press Ibadan in 1979 to become one of the oldest publishers in the country. Most of the works produced by the University of Ibadan publishers were works of élite Nigerians who had acquired Western education and whose works expressed in a nuanced manner the issues of pre-colonialism, colonialism and Nigeria’s Independence of 1960 (Ayobade, 2008). The choice for the University Press Ibadan to publish Rotimi’s work was I think partly influenced by the story and historical circumstances portrayed in the play as a reflection of the dominant ideology of the time. This dominant ideology Eagleton specifies consists of a definite, historically relative structure of perception, which underpins the power of a particular social class.
The suicide of Kurunmi in Rotimi’s Kurunmi represents an unyielding clash between members of the aristocrats, between the King’s and the Oba’s, the chiefs and the elders who want to legitimize their power. Kurunmi therefore, sensing his defeat from the war he initiated and knowing that he will not be politically relevant after the war decides to take his life honorably.
Soyinka’s Death and the King’s Horseman (1975) is no doubt a representation of the historical circumstance of the Yoruba people of South-West Nigeria.
Apart from dealing with historical issues, the play reflects the cultural attitudes of the people as well as their socio-economic life. The play accounts for a vivid episode from western Nigeria's colonial period, in which a British district officer intervened to stop the horseman of a dead Yoruba chief committing ritual suicide, as tradition dictated. Stylised and poetic, Soyinka's play explores the gulf in understanding between the horseman, who happily accepts his fate, and the Dickensian district officer, who views this potential suicide as barbaric.
Although Soyinka strongly advises against the interpretation of Death and the king’s horseman as a clash of cultures, the plays depiction of an abrupt intervention of a ritual sacrifice by a white-man challenges his introductory
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warning to interpretation of the play. Soyinka, already a member of an élite class received Western education from the University of Ibadan and became the first head of department of Theatre Arts. His father was a headmaster during the 1950’s which affirms his status quo. In 1975 when Soyinka wrote Death and the King’s horseman, he was in exile in London. His play portrayed a power structure from the King to the horseman down to the elders. Apart from the play serving as a depiction of the cyclical nature of the African world, it also reveals the power relations and the politics in culture and tradition. Lukacs (1971) in his ‘reflection model’ to Marxist literary analysis says every work of literature is a direct reflection of society’s consciousness and the author’s ideology at the time of his writing.
Wale Ogunyemi’s The Vow maintains and retains the same political ideology of his time. Apart from exploring the clash of culture between the traditional African society and Western society, the play clearly portrays the power relation and the political ideology of traditional African rulers. The clash in the play does not involve just any member of the community but it revolves around the ruling class in traditional Yoruba society set against the representatives of Western culture who are in themselves synonymous with élitism. The play presents a king who sends his son abroad to acquire western education.
However, before the return of the son, the King arranges for a would-be bride for the son. The son, Adubi, has already selected his bride from the Western country and brings her home. The father refuses to recognise Adubi’s foreign bride and insists on the one he has selected basing his decision on cultural practice. The clash that follows is between the king and some of his fellow elders who support him and Adubi with his side of supporters against the father’s decision. As the play draws to an end, it shows Adubi countermanding his father’s decision and the King kills himself in response to an earlier promise he had made to his ancestors that if “at any point he has to go against his words, the oracle should take his life.” The ideological struggle in the play and the politics constitute the framework of a Marxist literary analysis.
This background underscores the theoretical position of this thesis and appropriates the Marxist literary theory as a functional tool for literary analysis
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of these plays. The theoretical positions of Fredric Jameson, Terry Eagleton and Georg Lukacs will be used as the lenses through which to view these texts.
3. 3. From theory to theorists: Exploring Jameson, Lukacs’ and Eagleton as theoretical models for Marxist literary theory